


He Came From the Sky

by AWonder1



Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fear, Verbal Link, falling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-18 02:21:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29851092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AWonder1/pseuds/AWonder1
Summary: Hey look! Skyward Sword HD is coming!What if Zelda never caught Link when she pushed him off the platform?
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14





	He Came From the Sky

I don't know if I should leave this as a single chapter or make this a full story. You all let me Know! :)

Chapter: 1

“Oof!” I grunted, at the rude awakening of my back colliding with the floor. 

What a dream; or was that a nightmare? 

I couldn’t really tell, already the memory of the dream was fading away, but I still remembered the sharp feeling of fear I had felt in the dream. I could still feel the sticky wetness of sweat cooling my forehead, and the heavy thumping of my heart. 

Groggily, I blinked my eyes open to stare up at the roof of my room from my new spot on the floor; blinking a few times in an attempt to make my brain wake up and figure out why I was on the floor and not in my bed. After a quick scan of my small room my eyes landed on the face of a familiar blue loftwing. 

She cocked her head curiously at me as if to ask why are you on the floor? Before the large bird spat a letter at my head. After completing her mission, the bird gave a coo of farewell, before ducking her mighty head back out of my window, and letting the shutter fall closed with a slight bang, and a small buffet of wind. 

With the bird now gone, I got wobbly to my feet while looking down at the letter in interest. It wasn’t uncommon for Zelda to wake me up in the mornings, but it was uncommon for her to send her loftwing to wake me. That usually meant she had a surprise of some sort, and couldn’t come wake me in person. 

Curious, I gently lifted the seal of the letter to read its contents. As soon as I read the words ‘Wing Ceremony’, a burst of remembrance hit me. Today was the Wing Ceremony! Excitement soared up inside of me like a loftwing flying up to the heavens. 

Today was the big day. The day where I could prove to Zelda and everyone else that I had what it could take to become a Skyloftian Knight! 

With hope in my heart, and a spring in my step, I quickly got dressed and stepped out into the hall. I debated for a second if I should pause a moment to grab some food from the cook, but decided against it. I was really too excited to eat anyway, and I didn’t want to make Zelda wait any longer. So I ignored all of that which was around me, and went straight to The Statue of the Goddess. As soon as I got there I was greeted with the sight of Zelda’s back, and the sound of her practicing her part as the goddess for today’s ceremony. I had heard her practicing her singing before, but I’ve never heard nor seen her practicing with the instrument she was now holding.

Her singing was beautiful on its own, but with that strange instrument, it only made her voice even more enchanting. She really was born to play the role of the goddess.   
I waited patiently for her to finish her singing, before walking into her line of sight. She flashed me with a brilliant smile that outshone the sun, before turning and greeting me with a chirpy “Good morning.” And you know what? It really was a good morning. If you didn’t count my strange dream, which I didn’t, There really didn’t seem to be any way this day could be ruined. 

“I’m glad to see my Loftwing got you out of bed. I was pretty sure you’d sleep in and forget to meet me this morning,” she informed me. That was something I usually liked about Zelda, she would just tell you what she had been thinking, she doesn't drop hints or beat around the bush, she just out right tells you what is on her mind. It makes communicating with her so much easier. 

“But look at this instrument! And look at this outfit!” she continued excitedly. “They’re mine to use today in the ceremony.” 

She held forwards the instrument she was playing for me to look at. I had to say, it was very unique. I’ve never seen anything like it before.

“Aren't they Beautiful? Especially this instrument! They tell me it’s just like the one the goddess was said to have in the legends. It sounds gorgeous too. I asked Father about it, and he says that it’s called a harp.” 

She spoke so fast, I could hardly keep up with what she was saying. It was obvious that she was just as excited for today’s ceremony. Before I knew it she had already moved on to the next thing on her mind. 

“And look at these clothes! I made this rap myself.” My mind went blank at that point, as I tried to backtrack what she had said. 

She had made that outfit? I didn’t really pay that much attention to it before, but now that I looked at the clothes she was wearing, I could see the care and attention put into the attire that I didn’t notice at first glance. The dress was simple and modest, but very flattering for her figure. In one word, it was perfect. When my mind returned to the present, it took me a second to realize that Zelda was looking at me expectantly, with her arms held out regally at her sides, as she waited for a response for something.

Thinking fast, I just said the first thing that popped into my head. “You look great!”

She giggled in delight and I breathed a mental sigh of relief at saying the right thing. 

“Hah, I think so too! But it’s nice to know that you agree. Thanks, Link.” I returned her smile, before turning at the sound of a familiar laugh.

“Ah, there you are, Zelda. Are you all prepared for today’s ceremony?” Headmaster Gaepora asked, as he came to stand by us. Zelda’s father was a large, yet welcoming man. He was kind, but fair, and took no nonsense from anyone. I really liked him; probably because he liked me in return. 

“Oh, hello, Father,” Zelda greeted, as he finally came to a stop next to me. 

“Ah, Link, you’re here too. Outstanding. It’s encouraging to see you up so early, given your capacity for sleep. No doubt today’s ceremony had you too excited to close your eyes for once!” I nodded in agreement to his words. I was indeed very excited, and any form of grogginess I may have had this morning was already long forgotten. 

“If you win today’s ceremonial race, you’ll get to participate in the post race ritual with Zelda, so give it your best out there,” he reminded me, seriously. I nodded in reassurance. I was very confident in my abilities with Crimson, my loftwing. I couldn’t really explain it, but we had a bond like no other. When we flew in the sky together, we weren't two separate beings, but two bodies and minds melded into one. In the air, we were unstoppable.

I looked over at Zelda as she looked down nervously. “Yes. About that… Father, I don’t know if he can do it!” I winced at her sudden outburst. It was like she took a direct punch at my confidence. Sometimes it was nice when she spoke her mind, but other times I wish she would have a little more faith in me. 

She proceeded to tell her father of my practicing habits, which only lowered my confidence further. So what, if Crimson and I haven’t been practicing really hard? We’re still an unstoppable team, and it’s not like we really need to practice as hard as some of the other competitors. Their bonds with their loftwings were nowhere as strong as my relationship with Crimson. Even the bonds of some of the senior knights weren’t as strong. I looked up at Gaepora, wondering what his response would be. 

“No need to worry yourself, Zelda,” he reassured. As soon as he said that, I too was reassured. “Though you may have a point.” Darn it! “Today’s Wing Ceremony tests the skills of the rider as well as his bond to his bird. Victory will not come easily.”

I never said It would be easy, but if the biggest factor was the bonds with our birds, then I felt pretty safe.

I spaced out of what he was saying, and took a little trip down memory lane, as he continued to talk to Zelda. I remembered all of the bonding moments I had had with Crimson, the good and the bad. I remembered Passing our first flight exam with a perfect score. I remembered one time we got stuck in a storm, and had to spend the night together huddled onto a tiny island out in the pouring rain. I recalled the horror of trying to give him his first bath, and every other bath following that one. I remembered the time I had caught the Bird Flu, and how he always had his head sticking in my window so that he could watch over me. A smile was firmly set on my face, as I looked over and finally brought my attention back to what Gaepora was saying. 

“Yes, and the boy and his bird seemed to share a profound connection from the moment they met.” I quickly looked down in modest embarrassment at his words as I rubbed the back of my head. 

I again forgot about the conversation going on about me and turned my attention to the sky. I could see Zelda’s bird circling above our heads, as well as a few other loftwings. I closed my eyes and reached out in an attempt to sense my own loftwing. With deep concentration, I searched for that familiar feeling of our two minds brushing against one another; only to feel nothing. I opened my eyes with a frown, and looked up to see nothing but the endless blue sky, and a few brightly colored birds, but none of them were Crimson. 

I actually began to panic a little. This had never happened before. Crimson was always around close enough for me to sense. That’s what guardian birds do! They never stray far from their other half. 

“Listen, Link, you’d better fly your heart out today. At the very least, you need to squeeze in a little practice time before the race!” Zelda called, as she suddenly grabbed my hand, pulling me over to the diving platform, as well as out of my thoughts. “Come on! You’ll thank me later!” she assured, as she dragged me stumbling away from our spots by the statute. 

“No, Wait!” I tried to protest, as she pushed me up to the edge of the platform.

“Here we are. Go on now. Jump off the edge and call your loftwing. It’s almost time for the ceremony, so try to practice seriously for once!”

“No, Zelda! Something’s wrong! I can’t sense Crimson!” I Tried once more to express my fears, but was once again ignored. 

“Hmm? Oh yeah? You can’t ‘sense’ your bird out there? Oh, I get it. You’re trying to weasel your way out of having to practice! Nice try, but you’re not fooling me. Off you go!” And with that, she gave me a mighty shove off of the platform. 

I had jumped off of the platforms hundreds of times without an ounce of fear, but this time, my heart lurched up into my throat. My arms flailed in an attempt to catch my balance, as a short panicked yell escaped my lips. I just knew that something awful was going to happen. I managed to twist myself around so that I was looking up at Zelda and her father, while the air tugged at my hair and clothes, as if it was trying to catch me. 

I whistled for Crimson, just like I had done hundreds of times before, but no streak of scarlet came diving after me. I looked around in alarm, only to see nothing. Finally my eyes darted back up to the shrinking form of Zelda, just as she dove off the platform and whistled for her own bird. 

I reached desperately towards them as Zelda and her loftwing charged for me in a brilliant blur of cobalt. 

“Zelda!” I cried, pleadingly. Never have I felt such fear in my life. I could feel my heart pounding for freedom in my chest, as well as in my ears. My vision went fuzzy with my terror. 

“Link!” she cried in horror, as the talons of her loftwing just brushed against my fingertips, before I was consumed by the cloud barrier. 

0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

For a moment, I was too stunned to even scream. The wind still pulled at me in a losing battle against gravity, as I stared up at nothing but empty, white, clouds. For a moment that’s all I could see. There was nothing but whiteness all around me, as if the whole world had disappeared, and I was the only one left that existed. I shivered as some of the water collected on my clothes and froze with the wind pulling against me. 

I could still feel myself falling, but there was nothing around me to indicate I was. There was no ground rushing up to meet me, or shrinking images above me, there was just nothing but the feeling of the air beating against my body and shrieking in my ears. I was still upside down with my back to the wind and my face still looking up into the nothingness in a useless attempt to see the faces of those I was with. 

Finally, something changed. I broke through the bottom of the cloud layer. I didn’t even know that there was an end to it, no one did, but it happened. No longer was I trapped in nothingness. Now, I could actually see my death rushing up to meet me. The ground just kept getting nearer, as if it was trying to pull me down out of the sky. 

It was at this point, that I felt a scream building up in the back of my throat. The ground came in sharper detail as I got even closer, and I could make out the form of giant trees, like jagged mossy teeth that had sprung up for the sole purpose of tearing me apart. 

I guess I already knew that I was going to die, but it was at that moment, when I saw the ground rushing towards me, that it really sunk into my head. I was going to die. Never would I get the chance to become a knight, or graduate from the academy like my father always wanted me to before he died. But most importantly, I would never get to see Zelda again. Never would I get to tell her just how much I cared about and loved her. Never would I get to see her smile again or hear her voice. 

At this point, I did the only thing I could do; I prayed. And you know what? By some miracle, it actually worked.

With my eyes squeezed tight, I waited for the ground to give me that punishing, life ending slap, but instead, I felt even more air push against me, pushing me up and to the side. 

My eyes flew open in shock, as I saw the air blowing up at me from a large hole in the ground. I yelped in shock as I felt myself fly off to the side and finally stopped falling as I splashed down into a pool of clear water. 

For a moment, I was completely frozen as I sank to the bottom of the pool. I just couldn’t believe that I was alive! My burning lungs finally broke me out of my shock, in a reminder of my need to breath. I blinked and started to flail my arms and legs as I pulled myself up out of the water. 

My head finally breached the surface as I greedily pulled air into my lungs. My fingers turned to claws as I scratched my way to shore before collapsing into the squishy, yet mercifully solid mud. I was on solid ground. I was unharmed. I was alive. A knot tied itself in my throat, and water burned behind my eyes. My hands gripped the ground as I brought my forehead down to rest in the mud, before I started to cry. I couldn’t help it. I was just too relieved not to. 

I could not believe that I was actually alive. Then something even stranger happened. I laughed. I laughed at the same time tears dripped from my chin and landed on my hands. I laughed out of the pure joy of being alive. 

I don’t know how long I stayed like that, on my hands and knees on the shore line of the little pool I landed in, but finally I managed to pull myself together enough to look around at my new surroundings. 

After a quick scan of the abundant foliage around me, my first words on the surface world escaped my mouth. 

“What kind of world have I just fallen into?”

0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

Groose felt awful. Actually, awful didn’t even begin to describe how he felt. As much as he hated the shrimp, he never would want to actually kill him! All those times in the past that he threatened to, where just that; threats. 

It made no difference though. Link was dead, and it was all his fault. He never even considered the consequences of what locking Link's loftwing would be. Now that it was too late, and he actually thought about it, how else was Link going to find out about his missing loftwing, than by jumping off a platform, and realizing that Crimson wasn’t coming?

Needless to say, the ceremony had been canceled, but Groose couldn’t really bring himself to get upset about it. After all, it was his fault that it got canceled in the first place. Cawlin and Strich were also feeling pretty gloomy. Heck, everyone in skyloft was feeling miserable. Fledge blamed himself for not telling Link about their plans, Pipit was regretting not stopping Link that morning to talk, Gaepora was wishing that he had noticed something going wrong sooner, but no one was feeling guiltier than Zelda herself; the girl who pushed her friend to his death. The friend that warned her that something was wrong in the first place. 

After the official notice of the Wing Ceremony’s cancellation, Groose and the gang decided that it would be best to let Link’s loftwing go. There was no point in trying to hide what they had done, everyone was going to find out, and besides, he knew that Fledge would tell one of the professors eventually, or if he didn’t, someone would notice that something was up with him. Fledge never was good at lying.

Ironically, it was at that exact moment, when his door banged harshly against the wall, and a furious Pipit came storming into the room. Groose didn’t even have time to blink before Pipit’s fist came up to connect smartly with his jaw. 

“How could you!” he screamed. His face was a vivid shade of red with his anger, with his lips fixated in a snarl. Groose halfway expected spit to start flying from his mouth as he continued to yell. “I can’t believe you would do something like that! I had Fledge tell me everything. What were you thinking, locking up Link’s bird?! Now he’s gone because of you! He’s fallen below the clouds and could be seriously hurt!”

“You think I don’t know that?” Groose interrupted. “I may have not liked the shrimp, but I never meant to kill him! Now I have to live with the guilt for the rest of my life.”

Pipit stood there blankly. Of all of the things Pipit was expecting from Groose, guilt was not one of them. He didn’t even know that the boy was capable of such an emotion.

“I know I screwed up big time. I know that, and there’s nothing I can do to take that back. If I could change what happened, I would in a heartbeat, but nothing can change the fact that I’m now a murderer,” he said, as he went over and slumped down on his bed with his head in his hands. 

“Now, hold on for just a second. I never said that you killed him. We don’t know if he’s dead. I only said that he could be hurt, and even then, I’m only guessing. No one is saying that you murdered him,” Pipit soothed.

Groose didn’t give a verbal response, instead he gave an almost indistinguishable nod. 

With a sigh, Pipit walked over and placed a hand on his slumped shoulder. “Don’t worry, Groose. We’ll see Link again in no time,” with that said, he turned around and left Groose to wallow in his own guilt.


End file.
